The Rain
by alexmarie3
Summary: Post-Intoxicated...Olivia needs to clear her mind. Rating is for language.


Summary: Just a short little ficlet that has been in my head since I saw "Intoxicated" a couple of weeks ago, and I just got around to writing. It's from Olivia's POV, and the rating is for some language.

Authors Note: INCLUDES MASSIVE MAJOR SPOILERS FOR "INTOXICATED"! Like I said, it's very short, I just felt like I had to write it. Oh, and I did it in about 20 minutes, so I'm sorry if it sucks. I wrote it right after I watched "Intoxicated", and then sort of forgot about it. Ha, silly Alex.

**Disclaimer: I do not own L&O: SVU, or the characters. I'm just borrowing them.**

**Feedback…would be beautiful**

I roll over in my bed, and look at the clock. 3:17. Damn, it's only been 3 minutes since I last looked. I had gone to bed at midnight, and I still haven't slept at all. I hadn't realized how much the Eldridge case was going to affect me.

I still can't believe that I told Casey that story about my mom. I don't know Casey all that well…we work together. Sort of. I spilled my heart out to her, something I never do, to anybody. How else was I going to explain why she needed to plead Carrie Eldridge out? That story had been harder than I had though to tell. All those emotions just…flooding back. The abuse, the drunken rages, those few precious sober moments. I had blocked it all out for so long…who knew that I was going to have to deal with a girl killing her drunken mother? I know what it feels like; I've been there.

3:19. Oh, my god, this is pointless. I climbed out of bed and threw on some track pants and a loose, long-sleeved t-shirt over my tank top. I stretched out for a second, then went downstairs to the ground floor of my apartment building. When I got downstairs, I opened the door and stepped outside; a burst of cool air hit my face. _Lord, it is cold_. With that, I took off running down the street, hoping that maybe it would warm me up. My feet pounded on the sidewalk rhythmically, creating another sound in the music of the city.

The courtroom this morning had been awful. Carrie described her mothers "drinking habits", as all of the lawyers had called them. The damn lawyers, they don't know shit. They don't know shit about having your mother look at you, and instead of feeling overwhelming love, all she feels is hate for the man who raped her. They don't know shit about being shocked when your mother was sober, rather than when she was drunk. They don't know shit about finding liqueur bottles in the hamper, or the back of your closet. They don't know what it's like to be truly terrified that your mother might kill you, or to have the feeling that you want to kill her first.

I identified with Carrie Eldridge. We dealt with the same crap, the same confusion as to how a mother could love a bottle of vodka more than she loved her daughter. When I found out that Denise Eldridge was an alcoholic, I could honestly say that I did not blame Carrie one bit for what she did. After all, I had almost done the same thing when I was 16. But whether or not Denise deserved it wasn't my choice to make. All that mattered was that Carrie had killed her mother, and now she was going to pay.

My legs were starting to hurt a little bit. Not very badly, but enough that I knew I had been going for a while. What time was it anyway? I didn't have a watch. Just then, I passed a bank with a large digital clock on the front. 3:52. _How come time is going so much faster now?_ The air was cool, but humid. It looked like it was going to rain. The weather matched my mood. Running down the road I could smell coffee coming from a 24-hour diner, and I saw a couple of teenagers running up and down the street, yelling, laughing, and most likely breaking curfew. _So this is what it looks like at 4:00 in the morning_.

My legs were seriously hurting, and my breathing was becoming labored, and difficult. But I couldn't stop. I had a burning desire to run, to run until I couldn't run anymore. When I'm running, I'm not thinking about the Eldridge case, and when I'm not thinking about the Eldridge case, I'm not thinking about my mother. When I'm not thinking about my mother, I'm not crying. I couldn't let myself cry, after all, I'm Olivia Benson, the master at hiding her emotions. No one has ever seen me cry. At least, until Casey last night in the bar.

My mind went back to the bar last night, or this night, or whatever it was. It was stupid, telling Casey my story. I've never told anyone that story, not even Elliot. I tried to block it out. It was true, what I had said to Casey, about talking about abuse making it real. I had never put that emotion into words before, I mean, how could you? When I was a kid, I liked to pretend that my life was just a really bad nightmare, and in reality, I had a great family. In my imagination, I had two parents, who loved me, and only drank a glass of wine with dinner. I had a sister, and a dog, and plenty of friends. But then my mother would come home, pour herself a glass of god-knows-what, and I would know that my life was a nightmare…the only difference was that I was living in it, every day.

My head was spinning with my aching legs, and heavily beating heart. I felt a drop of rain. _Great, this is exactly what I need right now_. Now the sky was crying for me. Soon, I would be crying for myself. I hate my goddamn mother, for doing this to me. For putting me through hell as a kid, for making me an emotionless robot, scared of the world, but will never show it. I don't trust anybody. I learned a long time ago that only the ones you trust can betray you. _Are you happy, mother? Are you happy about what you did, about how I turned out because of you?_ I wanted to scream, but I couldn't. Someone would wake up, see me, and think I was completely psychotic. Or worse, they would try to help me.

The rain was coming down in sheets, as I passed a city clock that said 4:47. I had to keep running, my tears were threatening to fall. _Don't cry, Olivia. Stay strong, dammit, stay strong!_ It was too late. The running wasn't working. All I could see in my mind was my mother in her drunken rage, coming at me with a broken bottle, screaming at me. I stopped running, I was breathing hard, and my heart was pounding. My mind was racing and I just couldn't take it. I knelt down, balancing myself on my toes. I just couldn't hold myself up anymore. And I was crying, tears streaming down my cheeks, while the rain soaked me through. I decided that I didn't mind the rain. In a way, while it beat down rhythmically, I almost kind of liked it. It was a shield, a blanket for my emotions, and my tears.

After all, no one can see your tears when you're standing in the rain.


End file.
